Superstitions2

A beginner on the path of spiritual growth is also scared of many things. If he becomes a vegetarian, he fears everything connected with meat. He thinks he can become contaminated even by the word “meat”. For him it’s as if he went on a hunt, strangled the first beast he came across and ate it raw. He’s afraid of the word “meat”, afraid to look at meat, talk about meat. He avoids meat-eaters, fridges where meat was kept, dishes it was cooked in, knives used for meat cutting. These four letters—“m-e-a-t”– he also fears, just in case. A person sincerely thinks that by getting in touch with all these, his consciousness becomes contaminated and he loses qualification and purity necessary for spiritual progress.

As a matter of fact, he is not afraid of meat – he is afraid of himself because attachment to old habits still stays in his heart and doesn’t want to leave. So far as the heart lacks due humility and sincerity, the fear of the past is transferred to external objects and causes additional problems. Life gets very complicated. It turns out that everything around is polluted by meat. It seems all people are meat-eaters and have only one thing on their mind: to add a few bones to the vegetable broth, sneakily. So, a beginner vegetarian doesn’t trust any kitchenware. He sees nothing but dangerous meat all around playing a dirty trick on him.

Meanwhile, we are not so much polluted by the things we reject as by our doubts about the decision to reject them. Second-guessing the choice to become a vegetarian – this is what is really contaminating, rather than the meat itself. And then there’s yet another point I’d like to highlight. I’d like to speak about family problems that arise on the basis of that same superstitions. For a family man, it’s not the opposite sex but his second thoughts about the life partner that contaminate him. Everybody fights against adultery, but no one wants to fight for the purity of consciousness. By the way, the whole problem is rooted in the lack of understanding of family life philosophy.

We fear for our partners and fear for ourselves because we CREATED a family WHILE being unaware of its purpose.

We live in an imperfect world; hence the family life is also imperfect. To pick a perfect partner and make a perfect family is simply impossible. For this, WE have to be perfect ourselves, but we are not. Either the circumstances, or personality traits, parents or personal finance is imperfect. This is hardly surprising. At the same time it’s quite enough to know what to aspire to. If a husband and wife know it, then it’s almost a perfect family.